|
Paula | 
 enlarge | Author: Isabel Allende
Creator: Margaret Sayers Peden
Publisher: Flamingo
Category: Book
List Price: £7.99
Buy Used: £1.33
You Save: £6.66 (83%)
New (13) Used (22) from £1.33
Avg. Customer Rating:  14 reviews
Sales Rank: 23364
Media: Paperback
Edition: New Ed
Pages: 384
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.6
Dimensions (in): 7.8 x 5 x 1.1
ISBN: 0006548563
Dewey Decimal Number: 920
EAN: 9780006548560
ASIN: 0006548563
Publication Date: April 22, 1996
Availability: Usually dispatched within 1-2 business days
|
| Also Available In:
|
| Similar Items:
|
| Customer Reviews: Read 9 more reviews...
 Allende on top form - but a harrowing central theme December 3, 2004
16 out of 16 found this review helpful
I read this book for two reasons. Firstly, because I love Allende's writing. I have all her books and I have even bought three of her novels in Spanish, as an incentive to make progress with the language. The second reason is that my secretary's daughter died in '02, after many years of slow decline, at the same age as Paula.
I hoped I might find something in the heart-wrenching account that Allende gives us of Paula's plight that might help me help my friend in her grief. The description of Paula's illness and death is masterfully written. Allende spares herself and us nothing in the intensity of her description: this comes through even in the midst of the dreadful pain that Allende suffered and continues to suffer. On finishing the book, completely wrung out by the end, I felt that there is nothing comparable to the grief of a mother bereaved. What Allende has described with such searing clarity, the furious, inconsolable grief of a mother whose child has died, is what I see in the eyes my friend. Those without children, as I am, cannot visit that place.
Her description of her family and Chile and life, alternating with the passages of the account of Paula's passing, are intriguing and colourful in the best Allende fashion. An interesting aspect, for me, is in trying to gauge how much Allende the story-teller is predominant over Allende the factual writer. After all, she admits that she has 40 versions of how she met her second husband - and he says they're all true. However embroidered her account of her family and life in Chile and elsewhere might be, it's rich in atmosphere and spirit, as we have come to know of Allende's writing - and it is blessed relief from the rigours of her account of her daughter's final year.
A tough and touching book.
 very touching but a bit pretentious October 21, 2004
4 out of 10 found this review helpful
I've read a number of Isabel Allende books and found them all a very good read. Paula was the last one I read and felt really touched by the tragedy of Allende's daughter. The first part was written during Paula's stay in a hospital in Madrid and makes you feel as if you were there Allende and listened to her stories from the past. However the second part was written some years after Paula's death and seems to me a little pretentious and concentrates on the life story and greatness the author. Still a very good read, but however difficult it might be to criticise when someone writes about their own personal tragedy it is not the best of Allende's books.
Moving and Inspiring September 3, 2003
13 out of 13 found this review helpful
I have read Allende's work before and was aware of this particular book. But I was not sure what led me to read Paula. My motivation most probably would have been trying to deal with an illness that has befallen a family member close to me. What Allende did do was allow me to better understand the complexities, mysteries and anger of dealing with such tragic events.Paula is very accesible to read, yet operates on many levels. It allows the reader to take out of the book both deep emotional meaning or just enjoy, albeit with great sorrow, the amazing and unique style of Allende. Read this if you are interested in how national and international politics and changing social mores affect one family; how humans confront the manifold experiences, good and bad, laid before us. As trite as it sounds, Paula reminded me there is more to life than the immediate moment and surroundings. It shows us to both live life to the fullest, but also be patient when times are hard. Or simply read Paula if you are after a great piece of writing that would be fitting for a fictional novel, if it were not for the real tragedy that inspired it. Befitting Allende's style of writing, magic-realism transcends the book, especially Allende's references to the spirits of her family that come to her at certain times. The meaning I drew from this was that we can draw inspiration, reflect and use our memories of those past to guide us forward and assist us in times of sadness, or emphasise the happiness we feel other times.
Beautiful October 16, 2001
7 out of 7 found this review helpful
I have never cried so much with a book. In this book Isabel Allende talks about her own life and the life of her family with the same magic as if she was talking about one of the characters in her books. It is interesting to see how some members of her family and people she has met have inspired her to create the characters of her other books.
Wonderful, possibly, no probably her best book so far ! July 13, 2001
6 out of 6 found this review helpful
Although being an admirer of Allende and having red all her previous books (in addition to being hispanophile with several trips to S-American countries including Chile) I decided in advance not to read this book. "Nobody can well write about such a tragedy as losing her/his own child, it must be depressing." was my bold statement. My wife red it and recommended it warmly so I gave it a try. How wrong I was ! All about love and good and bad things in life (and death) of persons and a whole people, so humane it makes you cry and laugh... and think about the great gift of life and love. Possibly and in my opinion probably her best, leaving the reader deeply touched and wiser about life and love.
|
|
|
| |
